Have you taken a good look at the Rick Caruso project? I don’t know about you, but I don’t need any more fancy shopping and a bigger parking lot on Interstate 5 in Carlsbad.
A recent political meeting featured Mayor Matt Hall advocating for the mega mall as if it was a done deal with no opposition presentation.
Mr. Caruso was there, very charming as always. He even suggested bringing me in from Encinitas for the vote.
Not sure, but I think he was kidding.
Do you trust the officials hired to draft the plans for this project? Where is the oversight of development plans if the governing body of the city is assisting the developer with legal support?
Where are the conceptual models? Scare tactics have been employed in terms of what would happen to the land if this development is nixed.
Can the developer make changes if Prop. A passes?
Few people have scrutinized the issues to see what’s really going on behind the screen.
With 397 pages of the plan, one of the councilmen said he hadn’t read it but voted “yes” anyway. Sound familiar?
Last Saturday afternoon the traffic was heavy and it was nearly impossible to find a parking space at The Company Stores. The price of a piece of luggage I needed was about $200, so I ended-up at TJ Maxx and got the exact same thing for $79. That’s what I’m talking about!
The more closet space I have, the more stuff I accumulate to fill it — not unlike, in this case, more lanes, more cars, more sitting in endless traffic, more pollution, more insanity.
Where does it end?
The revenuers/developers/city council elders never have enough of our tax money.
That’s just what they do.
Encinitas is more of a bedroom community than Carlsbad, but we are fighting the same battle, trying to hold on to the little bit of open space we have left. Our liberal state legislature endorses and enables these policies leaving us vulnerable to lawsuits if we don’t comply.
It is not elitist to object to ruining our communities with too much development.
As a conservative and a conservationist, I oppose more gratuitous paving of the planet despite the lure of another Nordstrom next door and the efforts of a charismatic developer who thinks it’s a good idea for North County to look more like “The Big OC,” or because SANDAG and Caltrans don’t have a better solution to ongoing transportation challenges.
I oppose more “affordable” housing on the coast where it doesn’t belong, where most people don’t know that tons of subsidized housing already exists.
I wasn’t opposed to the desal plant, but I do object to the claims of a drought that have been proven to be mostly political, and now we’re paying for water being dumped in a local lake because the contract was signed to purchase it, as rates continue to rise.
None of this is good planning and our coastal quality of life is at stake.
The vote on Prop A is scheduled for Feb. 23.
Celia Kiewit is an Encinitas resident.
5 comments
I see the Mob moving in to Del Mar by the way of Brooklyn Mobster Guy Mistretta, word is he is looking for a summer home… it could be worse as he is not interested in street crime and may even help get rid of the crap!
Noteworthy facts:
Caruso Affiliated gave $50,000 to the San Diego County Republican Party on 12/30/2015
Callidus Consulting is paid a monthly fee by Mayor Hall to “manage” his campaign (didn’t know he was running at the moment, yet she still gets paid); at the same time Caruso is paying Callidus tens of thousands of dollars. For what? No one will answer that question.
Callidus Consulting is paid a monthly fee by Mayor Hall. That is a matter of public record accessible via documents on the City’s website. Callidus also serves as Hall’s campaign manager as well as assisting the campaign of Councilmember Schumacher. That is also a matter of public record. Callidus Consulting has been paid tens of thousands of dollars by Caruso Affiliated. That is also a matter of public record. For what specific services? We don’t know. Is there anyone naïve enough to think that this is just a coincidence?
A good rule of tumb is that any organization that has “The Right Way” in its name (“Preserving Carlsbad Open Space the Right Way”) probably isn’t.
When I started getting multiple mailers in my mailbox every day, sometimes three and four at a time, for weeks and weeks, before there was even a ballot measure, just a city council vote, I began to smell a rat. It turned out to be a “mall rat.”
These clowns shot themselves in the foot, at least for this Carlsbad resident, with their incessant drumbeat of glossy propaganda. Anyone who throws that much money at a project strikes me as begin up to absolutely no good. I mean Christmas cards from the Carusos? Seriously? I can’t claim to be the brightest bulb on the tree but at least my filament is glowing enough to see the light.
I signed the petition and I’m voting NO.
I look over the Lagoon and cannot understand why a big mall is needed when everything I want to buy is already on offer in the wide range of existing nearby stores. The idea that people will endure an ever more crowded highway and a whole new series of stop and go signs to drive into a multilevel garage to buy a pair of super expensive shoes at Nordstrom’s is ridiculous. The Caruso marts are all in much more urban places and he is introducing that concept into an area that should remain open space with little human intrusion and as natural as possible. He is just building up anger and enmity that will not end after this proposal is built. In the meantime, the rubes who run the city, financial incompetents from their record on such things as golf courses, empty buildings, and suits against a power company to stop a plan they now seem to embrace. They are the perfect naifs that a clever man can readily seduce as Caruso has much of the City with his moneyed campaigning. Do not trust flatterers or outsiders bearing gifts are still good advice.
Comments are closed.